Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Some economic discussions - 4

Going with the times, the economic discussions turned way more political than usual today. Here is the whole content from Anand's Facebook page. The FB reply to comment policy has created multiple strands within the same thread. So I will try to keep it as clean as possible.

Safdar Hashmi was murdered by Mukesh Sharma, the Congress-backed independent candidate, in broad daylight in 1989. The mourning for Hashmi had united the creative community in Delhi and far beyond. "There has been no coming together of this type. A great force of artists, intellectuals and painters has gathered spontaneously." Habib Tanvir said about the the Hulla Bol movement.Some criticisms were expressed at that time that may seem very familiar. In 1989, some argued that the protests were too strongly driven by Leftists. Why had these writers and artists not been as vocal about other atrocities, other deaths, some asked then. But those questions had the same answer as they have today: "because there comes a time when one murder, as senseless and inhumane as all the others, allows you to mourn openly all that you have been mourning silently. Sometimes one loss, no different than the others, lets you acknowledge the many wounds and losses inflicted over time. This is how we have arrived at this moment. Each generation finds its own flashpoint."

Comments

Siddhartha RastogiI read the 1989 Simran Bharagava article of India Today (Link below). It is amazing that despite the murderer having the direct links with the ruling party, the government was not agitated against or gor implicated. The protesters came together and created more art.

Whereas, in the recent cases, it is not even known if these are murders of political or personal nature, if there is any institutional or political involvement, if government took due care or not and so on...

And yet, somehow, all the old and new protests are against the central government. There is not even any statement or pressure to ask the relevant state governments for pacing up the murder probes. Reeks of political motives and malice only.

Anand MishraI will speak for myself and no other : I am not comfortable with the brand of conservative nationalism infused by religion BJP is pursuing, which is a curious amalgam of revivalism, xenophobia and triumphalism. I was fine with renegotiating the meaning of secularism and the questioning of pseudo-secularism, which should have meant the equality in the application of the law. But I am convinced now that BJP and RSS are not even interested in it.The secularist argument was made demanding a uniform set of laws instead of a separate code of personal laws (such as marriage, inheritance). The twist today is that the debate seems to have died down. We don’t hear the BJP demanding the abrogation of Muslims or Christians personal law anymore. What we have is almost a kind of new majoritarianism .A new kind of appeasement of majority. A hankering for a country colored saffron.

Siddhartha RastogiAnd by the way, this is not saying anything about how come the protests have turned against central government in the most sensation seeking manner? No creative streak - not a poem, not a painting against the "oppression", no agitation against law and...See More

Siddhartha RastogiI will wait... I guess, there are no other options either. However, the Hashmi murder happened in January and by May, the India today article was written. Perhaps, those agitations took off because of more camaraderie and honesty and these ones are getting mocked because of political nakedness.

Anand MishraForgive me , if I am inclined to go with some of the writers from this group I have read. Perhaps a few individuals of this motley protest group do not have kosher motives behind all this , and of course many of them are political , I don't even care about this returning of awards , but I think this is one of the best things that has happened in India in last few years - the unplanned coming together of people . I don't even think bjp should care , because it has such a large following , but mark my words , history would look at it differently .

Siddhartha RastogiYou would be surprised how BJP's traditional supporters are disenchanted and disappointed in BJP because it is trying to be too centrist and not being (as many extreme right-wingers wished) revivalist, triumphalist, or witch-hunting against leftists, opposing ideologies, Congress leadership, and so on. And I am yet more curious to witness and understand the instances of "conservative nationalism" that BJP-RSS have displayed.

Anand MishraAlright, if you insist on examples, there aplenty from my perspective , I will give you one that reeks of duplicity:The slaughter of cows was banned in many states of North India for quite a while, mostly since the 1960s. What was allowed was the impor...See More

Siddhartha RastogiWell, the fact that I remembered are slightly different. So I checked again (link below). In Maharashtra, cow meat was banned since 1976. In 1995, BJP-SS govt proposed a bill to expand the definition of cow meat. In 2015, they got it through. The cow m...See More

Anand MishraNo this was an example of majoritarianism., and if you don't see the triumphal and conservative nationalism all around you then Sid I don't think any argument offered here would convince you otherwise . And yes my point is exactly that Congress made it bad , BJP is making it , the beef drama , worse .

Siddhartha RastogiWell, I guess, I don't see it at all. Yes, there are lone loony voices and they get bashed up by most among the majority. But few fringe are given that space of publicity by media only. Frankly, nobody cares about those loony fringes or about the politicised protests or about the sensationalist media.

Siddhartha RastogiI guess we are... no judgment here but as an old friend, may I say just that mine seems more secure for the time being because of I have opened more windows on both left and right sides?

Siddhartha RastogiAlso, the above argument doesn't mean I am very happy with the government. But leave my points of unhappiness for a while. Read Arun Shourie's comments. While he is too harsh in his usual style, he is speaking the mind of the masses on many counts.

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Hi, I am Siddhartha. Originally from Lucknow, holding a doctorate in Economics from IIM Ahmedabad and now a professor of Economics at IIM Indore. Wanna do thousands of things... one of which is blogging :)